Olivander wandered back to the kitchens. They were empty. Apparently the god of feasts had taken the cooking golems and the extra food with him. Even the constructs Olivander had created to build golems were gone. In the room with the golem parts, he found the other reward he had been granted for completing the trial.
He had opened many dungeon chests, and wasn't particularly interested in what they had for him, but it couldn't hurt to take a look. Maybe there would be something to influence his class choice.
The chest sprang open at his touch. It contained five free stat point orbs, a thin book, and a circlet. He touched the orbs and they were drawn into him, and then he touched the circlet.
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You have gained 5 free stat points.
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Circlet of Perseverance
* Armor: Head
* Rarity: Epic
* Grants the wearer increased endurance.
* +50 mana
* +100 stamina
* +100 health
* +20 constitution
* Grants the wearer an ongoing buff that increases confidence and the drive to endure.
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"Bah, garbage. It's always the ones with great stats that want to take over your mind."
One too many run-ins with sentient enchanted items made him reluctant to equip anything that would affect his mind so directly. Still, he put the circlet in his robes. He could probably find a use for it. He reached for the last item.
The thin book seemed old and worn. There was a title on the cover, but Olivander couldn't read it.
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Unknown book. You cannot reflexively identify anything about this volume.
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"Now that is curious."
He set down the book on the floor and began drawing out a ritual. His grimoire was still a sword, though it would turn back soon, but he knew this ritual by heart anyway.
"Greater Identification!"
This time when he picked up the book, his natural skills supplemented by the ritual were able to identify the book. He still couldn't read it, but he gained an understanding of what it contained.
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Bvessington's Primer on the Gods, Volume 2
* Item: Book
* Rarity: Legendary
* A book written in a forgotten tongue describing the pantheon of gods.
* Warning: This book is bound to the divine realm, and will attempt to return there when outside of magically isolated areas.
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"Do personal trials have dungeon spirits? Is one of you trying to tell me something?"
Olivander turned around the empty space, waiting for a reply. None came.
"Blasted spirits only show up when they need something."
He sighed and thought out loud.
"If my grimoire behaves the same way after being bound to the divine realm, then I'm going to have a problem. I certainly am not going to just donate it to the gods. They can craft their own grimoires. I guess that means Golem summoner, here I come!"
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You have unlocked the class Feast Golem Conjurer.
You have unlocked the skill Conjure Lesser Feast Golem.
You have unlocked the skill Conjure Feast Golem Chef.
You have unlocked the skill Conjure Feast Golem Personal Assistant.
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Olivander's mastery over conjuration almost let him reflexively cast the conjuration spells, but not quite. He was about to try summoning one, when the world started changing again.
"Oh right."
A few moments later, he found himself back in the kitchen, as it used to be. It now felt tiny and cramped. There weren't any feast golems and it looked like a substantial amount of Leviana's cookware was missing.
"Maybe if I could read this book it would tell me the god of feasts is also the god of thieves."
He could feel the small book in his hand start to move, as if it wanted to go somewhere else all on its own, but was a little sluggish. He shoved the book into his personal dimensional library before it had the chance.
Olivander could sense everything in his library if he concentrated on it, and he found that the book was quite content to just sit there without slipping off into other realms.
"I'll have to set up a nice magically protected space to go through that sometime. I'll have to figure out what language it's in and how to translate it first."
He was lost in thought for a moment before he remembered why he was in the kitchen in the first place.
"Oh dear, I'm going to have some hungry, and probably unhappy, people waiting for food. I do have some feast golem summons though. Maybe they can help."
He focused on his new spells to see what he could do with them.
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Conjure Lesser Feast Golem
* Spell
* Cost: 50 mana/hour
* You can conjure lesser feast golems.
* Lesser feast golems can cook and prepare food for service, but lack the intelligence to plan and organize a meal service.
* In combat, lesser feast golems can bludgeon or stab targets with basic cooking equipment.
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He wanted to summon one right away, but his mana was still low. He sat in a meditative position for a couple minutes, just focusing on mana restoration, and not letting his mind wander too much. Once he was restored enough to conjure a few things, he summoned a lesser feast golem.
The feast golem was similar to the golems he had been creating during the trials. They were a little better put together and had uniform parts. They didn't have the extra arm attachment he had created, which was a shame. He could probably learn to modify the spell later.
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Conjure Feast Golem Chef
* Spell
* Cost: 100 mana/hour
* You conjure a greater feast golem who has the knowledge of a master chef.
* The feast golem chef can plan and prepare meals for small gatherings, or direct a brigade of lesser feast golems to prepare a true feast.
* Accepts summoner input, but does not require it.
* In combat, it can use its creator's mana to cast food related spells, buffing and restoring allies, while debilitating enemies.
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"Now we're talking!"
Olivander summoned a feast golem chef. It coalesced from magic into a large figure, two heads taller than Olivander and nearly as bulky as Gregory's father Burtrum. It was a construct golem, composed of complex interlocking parts like the lesser golems, but it wore an apron and comically large chef's hat.
"Very nice! Can you and the lesser golem get working on a meal for eight people? We lost a lot of food in that trial, so just do what you can with what is left."
The golem nodded, but didn't speak. It gathered up the lesser golem and they collected all of the supplies from around the kitchen and pantry, planning what they could in a language of spinning gears and whirring gizmos.
Olivander was delighted to find out that his feast golem chef could conjure kitchen equipment itself. He felt the mana pulled through their connection though, and it gave him a slight headache. His natural recovery was enough to maintain them as long as they didn't conjure too many things, so he didn't stop them.
A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.
"I'll leave you to it! Please don't invite any gods over for dinner!"
He walked out the kitchen door to deliver the bad news about the amazing feast he had planned.
* * *
Cooper was a little jealous that Gregory was the one who got to go and play detective with the constable. It wasn't their fault they didn't realize they were in the presence of a great detective.
One time, he had lost a ball for an entire week, but didn't go to look for it, because he had a spare. He was content with just one. But when that ball went missing? Cooper opened an investigation and found the balls in record time. His superior sniffer was surely better than just asking people questions.
What was the point of that? They could just lie. People loved lying.
Instead of investigating, Cooper was keeping an eye on the recovering Wentzle. It was an important duty, so he accepted without fuss. Gloria came by to check on Wentzle occasionally, and she always gave Cooper a reassuring pat on the head. He liked her. He was less sure about everyone else in the room.
Leviana especially seemed to be trying to make light of the situation and chat with everyone. Maybe she was just trying to keep everyone calm, since they were trapped in here.
Shortly after Gregory came and grabbed Reginald, Cooper heard a voice down the hall to the kitchen.
Olivander walked out a moment later. His robes were full of holes, and he was filthy, full of grime and sweat. Cooper could smell it all on him. He had been fighting.
When Olivander saw the subdued people and Cooper sitting next to an unconscious body, he wandered over. No one seemed to notice Olivander besides Cooper, and he wondered if the magician was using some power to hide his presence. Cooper still had his trickster god mask that could do that, but it hadn't seen much use yet.
"Cooper, what happened? Where's Gregory?"
"He's in the next room with the Constable General. Someone tried to kill Wentzle! Gregory and the Constable General are interrogating people to try to figure out who did it."
Olivander, as usual, took the news in stride.
"Really? An attempted murder in my absence? Hmm, I can't say Gregory would have been my first choice for assistant, but there you go. What do you think, Cooper? I'm sure you've kept your eyes, ears, and nose open."
Cooper had been thinking about the investigation. He would have shared his ideas with Gregory, but he hadn't stopped to talk when he came out of the next room.
"I don't think the wound on Wentzle was caused by a human attacking him. I think it was a bite wound."
"Interesting. What did the wound look like?" Olivander leaned over Wentzle to take a closer look.
"There were two deep punctures on his neck. Maybe an inch apart. Gloria healed him right away, but I didn’t see any other wounds on him before that."
"Ahh, ritual enhanced restore life, a solid choice for healing someone on the verge of death. A single bite did that? Curious," Olivander said, examining Wentzle.
After a moment Olivander began sniffing intently.
"Do you smell that, Cooper? There is some foul smelling magic on this man."
"No, what is it? I've smelled him a bunch and didn't find anything."
Olivander stood up straight. He rested his hand on his chin in a thoughtful expression, looking at Cooper.
"Do you have any skill points, Cooper?"
"No, I didn't get another with my last level up. That was after fighting the ghost howlers."
"Not to worry. You haven't started leveling your 'dog' class yet, have you?"
"I don't know how. It's just sitting at level zero."
"I'm sorry, I don't think I ever explained non-combat classes. Gregory doesn't have one yet, and honestly, I forgot about yours. It's simple really. You just need to do things related to that class."
"That's it?"
"That's it!"
Cooper cocked his head and stared at Olivander.
"Well maybe there's a little bit more. You do dog stuff all the time. The difference is in intent! Just like with magic, leveling non-combat classes requires intent. You need to take actions relating to your class with the intent to level that class."
"So I just want to level the class, then do normal dog stuff?"
"Precisely! You once again prove to be wise beyond your years. I'm fairly certain Gregory was still sticking toys up his nose at your age."
Olivander conjured a ball.
"Ball."
"Now remember, you're only playing fetch because you want to become a better dog."
Olivander threw the ball across the hall and Cooper took off after it.
A few minutes later, Cooper received a gratifying message.
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Non-combat class "Dog (Basic)" has advanced to level 1.
You have gained 1 skill point.
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Cooper happily trotted back to Olivander with the conjured ball in his mouth.
Olivander was just beginning a conversation with the lady of the house, Leviana, who must have just been made aware of his presence.
"Olivander! I'm glad to see you're alright, but you come out of a personal trial and the first thing you do is play fetch with your dog?" She was making a face that Cooper associated with confusion in humans. They didn't seem to know about the head tilt.
"First off, Cooper is not my dog, he's his own dog."
"Thank you!"
"Second, why not? I can sense the dungeon boundary is still up. After the personal trial's magic has completely evened out with the local magic, it will fade, but that won't be for an hour, maybe two. It seems like we have time to kill."
He glanced back at the unconscious Wentzle and cleared his throat. "Erm. Time to burn."
Leviana just rolled her eyes at him.
"Do you know what happened out here?" she asked.
"Cooper has caught me up to speed. It's actually why we were playing fetch."
"...You're going to have to elaborate on that for me."
"Cooper, were you successful?"
"Yes! I'm now a level one dog, and I gained a skill point!"
"Wonderful. Now, I wouldn't normally tell you what to do, but I would highly recommend choosing the 'Advanced Search' skill that you mentioned you had the other day."
Cooper thought the idea was actually a good one, and probably would have picked up the skill sooner than later anyway. He mentally made the selection.
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Advanced Search
* Ability
* Cost: None
* You can find anything by scent, just by thinking about what you want to find.
* Does not require a reference scent, but you must know the target of your search.
* You can now smell magical effects and track them like regular scents.
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All around Cooper, the world changed. New smells blossomed into awareness. He could smell an almost unbearably potent power coming off of Olivander, he quickly shut that down so it didn't overwhelm him. He could smell another strong power coming from Lady Rhodes, but it wasn't as strong.
He could smell the magical effect that created the ball that he had set on the floor next to him, and even the trace magics in the enchanted items that he and Olivander had. All around the room there were new things to investigate, smell, and learn about everyone at the gathering. It was almost overwhelming.
"I can smell magic now…this is a lot."
"I can only imagine. I can smell magic through years of diligent training, but I still only have the nose of a human. I imagine what you can smell is far more significant."
Olivander turned back to Leviana.
"I smelled something familiar, and I figured if Cooper could smell magic, he would be able to track things down for us! He has a non-combat dog class. We were able to level it by playing fetch!"
"I don't know why I'm surprised when you say ridiculous things. I should be inured to it. Perhaps it's because I haven't seen you in years."
While the humans chatted, Cooper slowly filtered out smells he didn't care about. Enchantments, the inherent power of the people in the room. Eventually he landed on a truly vile smell. It was like a magical corpse was decomposing in front of him. The smell wafted off of Wentzle in waves.
Olivander saw the direction of his stare and asked, "You smell it now? We need to find the source."